Poems by Violet Fane [i.e. M. M. Lamb] :: :: University of Virginia Library

Beneath a grey cathedral's dome,
Which ev'ning mirrors in the Rhine,
Within a richly jewell'd shrine,
The bones of these three kings of old
At last have found an honour'd home.
King Barbarossa gave the gold,
And noble ladies of the land,
For love of Christ, when Faith was young,
Their rows of costly pearls unstrung,
And gave them with a lavish hand
To glorify the shrine, and mix
With onyx and with sardonyx,
And graven gems and rubies red,
With scroll-work all enamellèd,
And one great topaz at the head
Seeming almost a mimic sun
In size and lustre. Thus begun,
This costly shrine with ev'ry year
Grew bright with offerings, for here,

Laid side by side on their pillow of gold,
Repose the bones of those kings of old,
The three wise men who saw the star,
Caspar, Melchior, and Baltasar.

II.

It seems a mockery to me
That you should sleep on thus, you three,
Pillow'd upon one pillow; for
Tho' all of you at once adored
Before the manger of Our Lord
The Prince of Peace, it may have been
That fires of discord crept between
In the after-years, to part you three.
Some simple cause, maybe, of strife,
Plunder of grain, or raid of herd,
Or love of one or other's wife
The breath of discord may have stirr'd,
Kindling dissension and heart-burning
Between you three at a later day,
Of which we have neither legend nor word,
For that you went back by a different way,
To baffle the malice of Herod the king,
Is all we are told in the good old Book;—

Yet you may have waged intestine wars,
And may bear on your bones the bloodless scars
Cleft by the hand of the king your brother,
When, wildly glaring at one another,
Your dark eyes fierce with a murderous look,
To the wolfish gnashing of those white teeth,
How may have flash'd from without its sheath
The jewel-hilted scimitar,
Caspar, Melchior, and Baltasar!

III.

And then to lie on thus together,
Thro' years of dark and sunny weather,
In this, your narrow golden bed!
So narrow, that each poor old head,
Eyeless, and polish'd by Time, and brown,
Crown'd each with its circlet of diamond crown,
Almost touches the head of his brother king—
As tho' they were each one whispering
Some secret of State in the fleshless ear!
Their secrets would be strange to hear,
If ever those tongueless mouths find tongue,
And after the midnight mass is sung,
And after the midnight bell is rung

From the grey cathedral's growing spires,
They speak like their patriarchal sires,
Maybe in the language of old Judea!
Speak they as comrades, destined to share
A couch of state enrich'd with care
By King and Kaiser of after-time,
By knight and pilgrim and lady fair?
Or as foemen bound in the self-same cell,
Under the clang of a Christian bell,
'Midst an alien race, in a colder clime?
Was there peace betwixt you, or was there war,
Caspar, Melchior, and Baltasar?

IV.

Ah, all these years, ye silent dead,
How many prayers around you said
Had seem'd to you of purport strange,
Could ye have heard them! Change on change,
As stone upon stone has upraised this spire,
So change upon change, and desire on desire,
Ambition, and rapine, and hunger and blood,
The gold of the vile and the tears of the good,
Have built up this fabric which men call “Faith,”
With its flicker of life 'midst an odour of death,
As here, in this gilded chamber, are spread

These jewels and gold o'er the bones of the dead!
Do you mourn, you three, as you hear the knell
Of our hopes in heaven, our fears of hell,
And long for the days when faith was strong,
When daylight was measured by shrift and fast,
And matins and vespers and evensong?
Do you mourn for the days ere our faith had past—
For the palmer with wallet and cockle-shell,
And sandal shoon, and oaken staff?
Or then did you mock to yourselves, and laugh
At the twisted errors and crookèd saws,
And the Mother Church, with her ravenous jaws
Fang'd and open and eager for blood,
Like some monster that preys on her own tame brood,
Or an idol with victims under its car,
Caspar, Melchior, and Baltasar?

V.

Yet, if it chanced that ye did smile
At stolèd priest in fretted aisle,
At the sacred feast of the Eucharist,
Or at Christians marring the words of Christ,
To dupe the poor and to flatter the great,

And to keep the power in the hands of the priest,
Bethink you, in all this fraud and guile,
You three, lying here in your bed of state,
Rich with the treasures of early art,
Have taken your place, and have play'd your part!
You were bribed with the jasper and amethyst,
And the carven gems of the days gone by—
The gifts of the noble and chivalresque,
Wrought over in emblem and arabesque—
With the bended knees of the lady fair,
And the grey-beard pilgrim with fast and prayer;
'Twas this faith that seems now so feeble and old
That encircled your hollow brown brows with gold,
And that made you this shrine for your mouldering bones,
Wherein you might rest and act a lie,
Bright with the glimmer of precious stones,
And that carried you hither from lands afar,
Caspar, Melchior, and Baltasar!

VI.

“To act a lie!” for who are ye?
Ye three impostors! Answer me!
What do ye here in a Christian shrine,
Dragg'd from the city of Constantine

To deepen the letter of Scripture's truth?
Who and what were you? In your youth
What were your pastimes and who were your loves?
Did you camp among spicy Arabian groves,
Or dwell under the gilded minarets
Of the glittering city of Ispahan?
Were you Jew, or Affghan, or Turkoman,
Dealers in amber and amulets,
Or seed of the loins of anointed kings?
Ah, who would not smile if it were to be found
That you three skeletons, shrined and crown'd
With your shining chaplets of diamond rings,
Were only some poor old pagan bones,
Brought hither to preach in solemn tones
The grand old legend you did not know!
To be worshipp'd by Christian lips and knees
In this sacred fane, till the overthrow
Of man or the Church! . . . With such thoughts as these
Do I gaze on you now; but the sacristan
Seeks for the mediæval key
To lock you up in your narrow home
(The consecrated golden shrine
Beneath that grey cathedral's dome,
Which ev'ning mirrors in the Rhine),

So, handing to the worthy man
His anxiously expected fee,
I leave you, wondering who you are,
Caspar, Melchior, and Baltasar!

Cologne, August 16, 1875.

A LAWLESS CREED.

(IRIS TO THE WHITE CHIEF. )

“I desire no future that will break the ties of the past.” George Eliot.

If there is anything that will not die
When this, the “I” you knew, has pass'd away—
This slave of sun and shade, this helpless thing,—
Yet dreaming of some vague immortal germ—
If the dim fancy that my soul may live
Is but a dear delusion, nursed by Time
And made by habit more familiar still,
Yet not more possible; if never more
Myself, (the half of you), my form, my face,
My tender love of you, may live again,
Nor take some semblance of the shape they wore—
Then may my foolish yearnings go for naught,
And all my emmet castles in the air
Fall to the dust of vain imaginings!

Yet, if the voice that whispers to my heart,
“Something in thee there is that will not die,”
Be not the echo of a self-made creed,
And if some essence lives when I am gone,
Dispersed, or whirl'd away by storms of air,
Or lurking in the misty river-spray,
Or hiding in the chalice of the rose—
Then will I join myself again to you,
And breathe upon your brow and fan your cheek,
And I will cling to you in spray and mist,
Or you shall see some flower and think of me—
Your very thought, absorbing half my being,
Shall breathe my spirit home again to yours,
And I will mingle with you as of old—
This is the only Immortality
For which I hunger; and when you, my life,
Have pass'd away into some other phase,
Then can we cling together in the storm,
And mingle in the light of summer days,—
This is the lawless creed of one who loves;
Yet could I deem it all a fond deceit,
Then would I say, “Give me the ‘poppied sleep,’
And let my spirit fade away and die!”

From “The Idolaters” (unpublished).

THE KISS.

(FROM THE SAME.)

I watch'd you sleeping, lying in your arms,
And drank in, with mine eyes, in that half-light
The dim and shadowy profile turn'd aside:
Whilst breathing with you, 'twas as tho' I shared
Half of your life, and gave you all of mine.
I was so close—so close, so wholly yours,—
Yet suddenly I, waking, seem'd to feel
So separated from you by your sleep,
So jealous of the people of your dreams,
That o'er me stealing (tho' so near—so near!)
A sense of desolation, with a kiss
I call'd you back again to life and me.
Darling, forgive me for that coward kiss—
I trust too little, loving all too much,
To bear the thought of losing what I love.
Would I could see again that half-turn'd face,
And lie once more in those enfolding arms—
Would I could feel but jealous of a dream,
And kiss away all rivals on those lips

THE PLAIN WOMAN.

“I was not born to crown of golden hair,
Or wealth of deeper brown with russet tips,
Nor was the fashion of my body fair,
Nor did the hue of roses rich and rare
Hang on my lips,—

“Which parted not upon an even row
Of orient pearls, with dimple at the side,
Seeming to say, ‘Come, kiss me!’ in the glow
Of conscious blush; nor was I arch'd of brow,
Or starry-eyed.

“I painted some who were as fair as this,
For God had given me the power to limn
Both men and women; neither did I miss
The grace of colder Nature—lights that kiss
The ocean's rim,

“Or deep black shadows under forest trees!
And I could gather wealth of flowers and fruit,

And lay them down on canvas at my ease,
And I had power to subjugate and seize
Both bird and brute.

“I read of women who were fair, and wept
To know the world so deafen'd to my song
Because of this rough lyre, wherefrom had leapt
A grateful music, could one hand have swept
The cords among!

“Or, sometimes sleeping, did I falsely seem
As fair as were the fairest; then indeed
I wept at waking, for athwart my dream
Had flash'd a fairy prince 'neath evening's beam,
On prancing steed.

“He was a prince so like that king of men
Who pass'd me on the road, and let me lie
At youth's lone midway milestone; it was then
I cursed these faulty lines of Nature's pen,
And pray'd to die.

“A little more of lavish light and shade,
A little less of that or more of this—
Here tints that glow, or there the hues that fade;
Such subtle nothings as these few had made
Me good to kiss!

“A careless slip by careless Nature made—
A faulty measurement, a loaded brush
Or empty palette; I, who make a trade
Of seeking out the haunts of light and shade
Would almost blush

“To paint so poor a face! Yet from within
(Unlike the faulty failures on these walls,
The rough first sketches I did but begin,
Then flung aside), above this mundane din,
A voice there calls,

“Which says to me, ‘Thou art not wholly base
Since thou canst work and suffer.’ Ah, my soul!
Thou hadst been fair hadst thou but been a face,
Since thou canst bear the burden of this race
Without a goal!

“Nature hath warn'd me that I may not share
The pastimes of a brighter heritage;
Peacocks and daws peck not the same parterre,
Nor sigh yon homely wives of Chanticleer
For gilded cage,

“Wherein may sing some captive, on whose breast
Lingers, in mockery, the sunset glow

Flash'd through the green savannahs of the west,
Whereof he sings in sadness. It were best
That each should know

“All may not match in plumage with the hues
Of tropic birds upon their varied wing;
Each hath her sep'rate mission and her use,
And those endow'd with song-notes cannot choose,
But pipe and sing.

“For me to weep: yet with how rich a dow'r
Of woman's highest gift, serene and pure
As is the folded chalice of a flower,
My soul had met his love! With wondrous power
Giv'n to endure.

“‘Endure!’ Too cruel word! too cruel fate!
Seal'd from the dear emotions of the blest;
A thing too meaningless—beneath the rate
Whereat we measure common love and hate,
And doom'd to rest

“(I, who had gloried in a treasure-trove!)
Nursing a barren mem'ry all my life,
Proving the love he did not e'en disprove.
Ah! will the lissom lady of his love,
His promised wife,

“Bring him the treasure of so good a thing? . . .
I know not; for bright insects oft deceive,
Flitting upon the zephyr, murmuring,
And seeming all so fair of form and wing
That none believe

“They bear a sting; and women who are fair
Are often counted false—so many seek
To win their favours—flatter'd ev'rywhere—
Till love and change seem in the very air
They breathe and speak.

“I hope for him, yet fear. . . . Oh! if a day
Should dawn when he may know this aching pain,
This thirsting after waters turn'd astray,
This longing for those blossoms blown away
To bloom again,

“Then may he think of one whom long ago
He pass'd in silence by!” . . . She turn'd aside,
And down her cheek in blighted sadness flow
The tears that none compassion; whilst her brow,
(Not “starry-eyed,”)

Seem'd clouded o'er with mists of sullen thought;
Then, turning to her work, she lightly drew

An armèd knight, his breast-plate all enwrought
With steel and gold; her cunning pencil caught
His eyes of blue

And backward-blowing plume. This picture lay
With many a change of posture and half-light,
About her chamber: she would e'en portray
The careless look with which he rode away
Out of her sight.

Thus ended her sad song; and all unmoved
The careless swallows twitter'd as she grieved:
The fairy prince was gone. It is unproved
If by the lissom lady that he loved
He was deceived;

Perchance, the course of true love runs not smooth—
And we are told such things have often been:
Yet this I somehow learnt—a bitter truth—
At that lone midway milestone of her youth
He had not seen

That hapless lady of the faulty face;
Nor, if his life had sorrows, did he deem
Those sorrows sprung of any want of grace
In her or him, in any earthly place
Or in a dream.

He rode away, nor look'd to left or right,
Nor guess'd his passing made the sole romance
Of that poor loveless life, nor knew the night
Ensuing on the evanescent light
Of his one glance!

Should he have linger'd, and with eagle eye
Discern'd the pearl hid in so rude a shell?
Alas! if woman's love were deep and high
And sweet as is the spice of Araby,
This had been well!

Or if it were a thing as passing rare
As is the mystic death-note of the swan,
Then women who are plain, or others fair,
Would seem but varied blossoms, sweet to wear
And gaze upon.

But woman's love is oft a lighter thing
Than is the gold dust on the butterfly,
Brush'd with too eager pressure from the wing,
And losing by too careful treasuring
Both light and dye.

And thus it is, maybe, that on Life's road
Men will not tarry to unearth the gem

Lurking behind the eyelids of the toad,
When such a heaven of starry lights have glow'd
And shone for them.

And so they seek the facile, and prefer
The fairest first, nor slack their bridle-rein—
As I, who heard this lonely murmurer,
Turn to some brighter theme, away from her
Whom God made plain.

REST.

I am weary, I am weary! though the happy springtide voices,
Hope-inspiring, fear dispelling, are re-echoed on the breeze;
Sad and drooping is my spirit, nor awakens nor rejoices,
But it longs for rest, and babbling streams, and shadows under trees.

Yes, to lie beneath a walnut-tree, or cedar, in a garden,
Quaint, old-fashion'd, shut away from all the murmurs of the crowd,
Of whose gate some sculptured figure, Love or Time, should be the warden,
And where only voice of singing-birds should dare to breathe aloud—

Where a sun-dial would seem shrinking, chaste and chilling, from the kisses
Of the tender clinging clematis and star-like passion-flower;
And the tremulous convolvulus, whose closing blue eye misses
That faint shadow on the dial that foretells the evening hour.

Yes, and tho' I long for Nature, yet I long and long for ever
For a bowling-green which cypress shall environ on all sides—
Kept and clipt from times departed into peacocks, urns, a river
Too, with swans and water-lilies, and a lurking boat besides.

Are you jealous? Nay! with you, love, sun and shade, and flowers and cedar—
All with you, love! oh, my true love!—floating swans and lily-leaves;
Cypress hedge with urns and peacocks—oh, my lover, lord, and leader!
All with you, with you for ever, in these dreams my fancy weaves!

100

Yes, my darling,—yes, with you, dear, shut away by iron gateways
From the murmur, and the bustle, and the slander of the world;
Yes, with you beneath the walnut-tree, near sunlit grassy pathways,
By the dial round which the clusters of convolvulus are curl'd;

Where the swans await their feeding by the lazy, reedy river,
Where the boat lies moor'd away amongst the lilies by the shore:
Ah, with you, love! oh, my true love! would for ever and for ever
I could rest and dream and love you, and awake to life no more!

101

THE RIDDLE.

I ask not now, as once, what these things mean,
This earth, these seeming trees that branch and bear,
This good and evil, with this foul and fair,
All things perceived with those that are unseen
May go their ways, I neither ask nor care
What these things mean.

Once, as a pensive child, left all alone
In some sad chamber on a rainy day,
With an intricate puzzle for his play,
Whereof the key or clue was lost and gone,
I mused and marvell'd, trying every way
What these things mean.

102

Now I have thrown the puzzle in a heap,
Go, painted plaything! thus I fling thee by.
Either thou art too low or else too high
To waste my care on. Vainly did I try:
Now I am weary. Maybe by-and-by
My dreams may tell me, when I fall asleep,
What these things mean!

103

A MEMORY.

Where was the place? . . . Here are the wild white roses
And clinging honeysuckle, and here a pathway
Traced in the tall red fern. Alas! the changes
Which break so many hearts, at least have mended
That bent and broken bracken! So that surely
These bleeding stems and leaves were not by thee, love,
Thus crush'd to earth, but by some forest cattle,
Some antler'd stag, or timid fawn when sleeping—
Yet I had almost said thy vanish'd footprints,
And mine of long ago, had mark'd for ever
To memory sacred, this our place of trysting.

104

The years—the years! . . . Each crowding generation
Of tall green fern has risen (quaintly twisted
And crook'd at first, like crozier of an abbot),
And turned to russet, and the scythe has mown them,
Laying their straight brown stems upon the green sward,
For twenty autumns since that fateful autumn;—
No vague transmitted legend, no tradition,
No faintly floating mem'ry of that evening
Is whisper'd by this heedless generation
Of feath'ry bracken, when the ev'ning breezes
Sway all the pigmy forest. E'en the roses
Deem not their faded forefather is sleeping
So near my heart! These twining honeysuckles
Are not the pink and amber witnesses
Of my first love, but fair, forgetful offspring
Of those that tangled in my shining tresses
Ere they were grey: I dare not say, my darling,
What thou wert then to me, or how thy shadow
Seems standing o'er me now as on that ev'ning!
Alas, the years! the years! . . . How strange the bracken

105

Should thus be crush'd and broken! Has the phantom
Of our dead love held revel here by moonlight
In bitter mockery? . . . The wild white roses
Are here as then, the break amongst the bracken,
The clinging pink and amber honeysuckle—
This was the place. . . .

106

TO TIME.

Oh, Time! show mercy to me, and unwind
This tangled web, or tear the strands away
That twist and knot, and cause so great delay
In this fair work I fashion'd to my mind,
Help me, old Time!

My hands are helpless; I have toil'd so long;
Mine eyes are dim, my bobbins seem possess'd,—
They will not twist the right way and the best,
So all the texture will be netted wrong,—
Help me, wise Time!

This seems to thee, no doubt, a trivial thing;
A woven shred, that will endure, alas!
As short a while as on thy shifting glass
Lingers the echo of Death's cross'd-bones' ring;
Help me, good Time!

Shuffle the strands aright; thou art too great
To smart with envy at the little bliss
So poor a worm as I may gain by this,
Be on my side, and let us laugh at Fate;
Help us, dear Time!

107

TO A GARDEN.

Oh, happy Eden! where I roam'd of yore
In that sweet innocence I long for now,—
No childish innocence of fruited bough,
For I had bit my apple to the core;

But when the golden fruit seem'd doubly sweet,
(Unlike the tempter of a bygone day,)
A serpent came, and bade me fling away
What once he bade those first poor lovers eat.

Oh, had I never bent that magic bough,
And tasted of the sweetness that it bore,
My heart had been as careless as before,
And all these bitter tears unfalling now!

I curse the cruel hand that pointed where
My golden apple show'd a bitter flaw,
And his malignant eye, who smiled and saw
My best illusions melting into air!

108

But garden,—garden where I used to rove,
I bless thy orange groves and sunny sky,
I bless thy feath'ry palm-trees tow'ring high,
That overshadow'd what seem'd then my love!